Description

Heart of Darkness is the second expansion to Victoria II and requires the original game to play along with the first expansion A House Divided. It takes its name from Joseph Conrad's novel Heart of Darkness and fittingly one of the major components is a new model for colonization. This ties into the new naval system which provides you with the colonial points you invest in order to colonize, and the Scramble for Africa becomes more of a competitive free-for-all with some changes to the technology tree that allows a faster spread of the ability to colonize at various life ratings.

If two countries try to colonize the same region it turns into a race which can become the flash point of an international crisis, another new system in the expansion. Crises can also spark from nationalist movements and one can also use National Focuses to try to increase the tension in a region. Once tension is high enough and both sides are represented by great powers the opponents can ask or entice other great powers to take their side, all while the crisis temperature increases and unless a diplomatic solution is found - war will break out.

The naval system has been overhauled: Naval bases are limited to one per state (administrative region) and can only channel a limited amount of supplies used by ships, capital ships can not be build overseas, combat resolution model completely redone, new ship statistics/abilities like evasion, torpedoes, gun range and coordination penalties. Naval bases and ships are also the source of colonial points, so a strong navy is needed to support a large colonial empire.

Various other changes include a newspaper system with news from around the world (e.g. who's declared war on whom and why and also some real world anecdotes), improved diplomatic AI, industry synergies, improved capitalist factory build choices, rebalanced army units and more.